Worried about an AI apocalypse? Here’s how to think about the risk of doomTue, 22 Sep 2026 05:00:00 +0000 Commentators say the probability of machines wiping us out ranges from 0 to over 95 per cent. Columnist Jacob Aron explains why you shouldn't trust any of those numbers | |
Dramatic gannet dive wins Bird Photographer of the Year competitionMon, 21 Sep 2026 23:01:00 +0000 Henley Spiers took the top award in the annual contest, with shots of guillemots, penguins and a protective tawny frogmouth also in the running for the prize | |
Swimmer made of quantum light breaks Newton’s third lawMon, 21 Sep 2026 16:00:00 +0000 According to Newton’s third law, all actions are paired with reciprocal reactions. But breaking this principle allowed an artificial swimmer to move upstream in a quantum stream of light | |
The collapse of the AMOC would be catastrophic. How will we know when it’s coming?Mon, 21 Sep 2026 15:00:00 +0000 Europe faces incredibly harsh winters and unrelenting droughts if the vital AMOC ocean current fails – but when disaster will strike and how bad it will be remains uncertain. Now there is an ambitious plan to give us a warning | |
SpaceX’s Starship will orbit Earth for first time during next flightFri, 18 Sep 2026 14:00:00 +0000 Starship's next test flight will be its first orbital mission. The craft will also release working Starlink V3 satellites for the first time, making the flight the first commercially useful Starship mission | |
Physicists are scrambling to make sense of possible dark matter signalFri, 18 Sep 2026 12:00:00 +0000 Following the possible recent detection of a dark matter particle, researchers have already come up with a veritable cornucopia of possible models for what sort of particle it might have been | |
Fishapod fossil shows early elbows came in a variety of formsFri, 18 Sep 2026 11:00:00 +0000 The fish that preceded the first four-legged land animals came in a wider variety of forms than we had thought, and fossils show that one had an elbow joint that moved in an oddly restrictive way | |
Our brain evolved from two primitive nervous systems that mergedFri, 18 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000 The front and back parts of our brain come from different progenitor cells in embryos, which suggests they evolved as separate entities | |
See the dazzling images that won Astronomy Photographer of the YearThu, 17 Sep 2026 18:30:00 +0000 Stunning pictures of nebulae, stars, the moon and more took top prizes in this year's astrophotography competition, organised by the Royal Observatory in London | |
Robots clash in first naval engagement between uncrewed sea dronesThu, 17 Sep 2026 17:00:00 +0000 Earlier this month, the Ukrainian Navy used an uncrewed vessel to attack and sink an uncrewed naval robot operated by Russian forces | |